Although A Boy Called Alex originally aired on the 24th, I missed it. What else I was doing, I'm not sure, but I was thrilled that More 4 replayed the film again last night at 10:35. Did you see it? I hope you saw it, because it is a brilliant, inspiring little film that will instantly make you appreciate your life, and your lungs, just a little more.

A Boy Called Alex is about, well, a boy called Alex who is an incredibly talented musician and is 16-years-old. Alex is a music scholar at the prestigious all boy school, Eton, and has taken on the extremely difficult task of conducting Bach's Magnificat. As if this piece wasn't difficult enough to conduct, he has an orchestra filled with 62 of Eton's finest musicians. (Mind you, that's 62 teenage boys.) The catch? Alex was born with cystic fibrosis, which is a genetically-inherited disease which is slowly destroying his digestive system and his lungs.

Yesterday, I posted up a clip yesterday from the new Alan Carr series (Ding Dong) starting tomorrow night. Today it's the turn of his hairy sidekick, Justin Lee Collins. He's been on his own solo wingding for the last couple of weeks in The Conventional Crasher, and here's a clip from tonight's show (10pm). In this week's episode Justin tries to become a professional clown. Make your own jokes there.

So, Torchwood, eh? The tormented older brother of the irrepressibly cheery (except, you know, when it's not) Doctor Who. You should probably know that I watched the first episode of series one and decided there and then that I wouldn't waste my time on the rest of the series - it was all too considered: right, we'll have some sex here, a bit of violence there, and swearing. Lots of lovely swearing. You could almost here a little work placement girl asking 'and what about the story... or the characters?' Oh we'll come to that later!

But it seemed they never really did. Having said all this, I did feel like I was missing out slightly, and so I took it up again this series. And, as I suspected, it wasn't nearly so bad as I'd made it out to be in my own head. It's terribly flawed, of course, but it's still worth watching.

On February 11th, you can get your hands on some classic Doctor Who. Yep, the Beeb is releasing a new shiny spangly DVD of Doctor Who The Time Meddler, retailing at £12.99. Starring the original Doctor, William Hartnell, The Time Meddler was the first story to feature a Time Lord other than the Doctor. Big stuff!

The Doctor, Vicki and a surprise stowaway arrive on an English coastline in the year 1066 (why does that date ring a bell?). Whilst investigating a ruined monastery The Doctor encounters an electric toaster, a gramophone playing ecclesiastic chants and a mysterious Monk. The Monk is conspiring to wipe out the Viking fleet and thus allow King Harold to face the forces of William of Normandy with a full strength army at the Battle of Hastings. Can The Doctor succeed in thwarting the Monk's plans or will English history be re-written?

As a "network premiere" I notice this is being quite heavily trailed, but that's no bad thing as it's an excellent movie on all levels. Regular readers will know I'm a sucker for anything with Morgan Freeman in it, and Clint Eastwood makes so few movies these days that he tends only to pick good ones. But it's Hilary Swank who steals the film from both of these old hands. Her performance as the determined wannabe boxer Maggie Fitzgerald is pitch-perfect, intense and, in the end, extremely moving.

The Academy thought so too and awarded Swank the Oscar in 2004 for Best Actress. Million Dollar Baby also snapped up three others - Best Supporting Actor for Freeman, Best Picture and Best Director (also for Eastwood) - as well as securing 45 other awards.

What happens when a TV critic makes the leap from the page to the screen? Do you become part of the very thing you pull to bits or do you become an enemy on the inside?

Surprisingly, January was quite a busy month – there were shock docs on Channel 4 (including the genuinely shocking My Fake Baby), Hugh's Chicken Run, my fave Extreme Pilgrim, City Of Vice... the list goes on! Here's your chance to vote for your fave. If your top show isn't on the list... tell us!

Something odd happened last night. I watched Wonderland (BBC Two, Wednesday, 9.50pm) and felt that, before I'd even had chance to think, my mind had already been made up. The show, from the off, almost said "come viewer... come point and laugh at these warped freaks... no pity is needed. Get your scorn up and you best mocking laugh on. It's time to prod and sneer at the peep-show." So with that, I was immediately on my guard. This was a show that was clearly going to be dealing with exceptional cases and as such, will probably feature people who may have mental issues... and when did laughing at people with mental problems become okay?

Before I go any further, I'll explain what the show was about. The show looked at the online community of Second Life. Now, Second Life is an incredibly posh version of, say Myspace or Facebook. It's a social networking site which, instead of being a load of words and updates, features 3D avatars which you can control, walk around virtual cities... hell... you can even do the sex. It's the latter element that this show looked at.

Yes, here's your chance to be a star. Not like in a Big Brother, 15-minutes-of-fame, crash-and-burn sort of way, but a television personality of substance and integrity. Well, a presenter for BBC Three at least.

The channel, who recently announces a major overhaul, is looking for presenters. Or, more specifically, one presenter – a star presenter – to fit in with its new look. Interested? All you have to do is have a look at a website here, or go to the YouTube channel here, to see what you've got to do. Come on Scoopers, I know you can do it! One word of warning... you may have to have a 'modern' haircut to stand any chance of being a winner.

There's no doubt about it. The Stig from Top Gear is a bona-fide Small Screen Icon. People have scratched their bonces trying to work out who the hell he is. Some say that he's a load of different people as he's just too good... comedian Omid Djalili thinks that The Stig is F1 driver Lewis Hamilton. Wha'?!

Djalili claims that he's worked out that Hamilton must be the driver by questioning the show's bosses when he guested on the show. Djalili told Nuts; "When I was on Top Gear around two years ago, I asked the The Stig how old he was and he said, 'I'm 21' - the same age Lewis Hamilton would've been two years ago. And when I asked the producers who The Stig is, they said, 'All you need to know is that, in about two years' time you'll hear a lot about the person who plays him. They'll deny it of course because they're sworn to secrecy. I think it's part of the contract. But I'm telling you, it's Lewis Hamilton!" Surely Lewis has a diary a bit too full to be mucking about with Clarkson & Co?

Here's a clip from tonight's Cutting Edge (Channel 4, 9pm, which deals with the growing motor insurance scams that are spreading the country. Yikes!

It is the 16th century. From all over Europe great ships sale west to conquer the New World, the Americas. These men eager to seek their fortune, to find new adventures in new lands. They long to cross uncharted seas and discover unknown countries. To find secret gold on a mountain trail high in the Andes... Some of you will have read that and started to weep tears of joy (admittedly, some of you will be completely nonplussed), for those are the opening words of the greatest cartoon ever made. That is the opening gambit for The Mysterious Cities of Gold. For years, fans (myself included) have been pestering various organisations to get a reissue of the long running series to no avail... until now!

Children of The Sun, get ready for some exclusive packaging, an exclusive poster and exclusive postcards in a limited edition... and limited run... set that is gonna blow your mind! The Mysterious Cities of Gold is being reissued and boy, I can't wait! MCoG follows the adventures of a Spanish orphan named Esteban in 1532 who joins a party of Spaniards in their search for one of The Seven Cities of Gold in the New World, hoping to find his father. He is joined on his quest by Zia, an Incan girl, and Tao, the last descendant of the sunken empire of Mu. It's a thrilling mix of sci-fi, adventure, South American history, archaeology and swash buckling fights! And I've not even mentioned the Golden solar powered condor...

I shouldn’t really like Grand Designs, but I do. It’s a smug show full of smug people, ploughing their solar-panelled, cantilevered and modernist self-build furrows across our green and pleasant lands. Except, I LOVE modern design with a passion. Something about stark, symmetrical lines really does it for me and Grand Designs really takes away some of the stigma (if there is such a thing) attached to modern architecture – it’s people building homes for their families in a modern stylee, rather than just monoliths to look at.

Last night, a couple from Bristol wanted to build a giant sugar cube (their words, not mine) in the middle of a rural(ish) village stuffed with thatched houses and other visions of traditional house design. Unlike other episodes – where self-builders encounter all sorts of problems and budget-busting scenarios – the couple’s progress went like clockwork.

Jeremy Beadle died yesterday from pneumonia at the age of 59. He wasn't everyone's cup of tea. That much is clear from the fact that he was simultaneously voted the second most hated man in Britain and one of the most popular TV presenters of the 80s and 90s. When he first came to prominence in 1981 as one of the four presenters of Game For A Laugh (along with Henry Kelly, Matthew Kelly, and Sarah Kennedy), he was responsible for some of the most consistent and often painfully side-splitting laughter television has ever produced. He continued in a similar vein with Beadle's About, which became one of the most-watched shows on TV, and then moved on to present You've Been Framed for 7 years ending in 1997.

But it was as a charity worker and multi-million pound fund raiser that Beadle would perhaps most like to be remembered. Suffering from Poland's syndrome since childhood and recently diagnosed with leukemia, his work for both of those charities led to him being awarded the MBE in 2001. [BBC Obituary] [Guardian Obituary]

Crash, the multi-layered, Oscar-winning movie that told stories from the seething underbelly of Los Angeles, is to be made into a TV series. The film starred Don Cheadle, Sandra Bullock and Matt Dillon, among others, and it explored relationships between different ethnic communities living in the city, pulling no punches in its portrayal. Although it won lots of awards, I wasn't too bowled over by it, but no matter – its ambitious and densely-plotted narrative, fine acting and modern take on LA deserved most of the plaudits it got. I just found it a bit... dull.

Thanks to its success, the Starz TV network in the US is to make a 13-part series based on the characters and plot of the original movie. Don Cheadle and writer-director Paul Haggis will produce, and there are high hopes that it'll be a meaty and decent drama series. Still, I've got Zammo and Roland from Grange Hill ringing me in a few minutes (the interview will appear on the site next week as part of our Ashes To Ashes Week), so what do I care?

Here's a first look at the Five advertising campaign to let y'all know that Neighbours is moving after over 20 years on the BBC. Remember... as of February 11th, you'll have to press the number five button to get your soap kicks.

1. Who links? Monkey, University Challenge and The Cadbury's Caramel Bunny?
2. Whose surnames have included Fairclough, Bates, Littlewood and Sullivan?
3. Who is this? Character or actor will do...

4.What was the Michael Aspel fronted show called that had kids trying to describing things (with varying degrees of hilarity)?
5. Which little old lady made the celebs squirm on the sofa of her (spoof) chat show?

Answers overleaf...

Here's another clip from another Channel 4 show starting this Friday. The Law of The Playground (10.50pm) gives slebs an opportunity to reminisce about their school days – the snogging, the games, the phrases and the their teachers. It's quite good fun without being must-watch TV. There's a good selection of comedians and good people involved, so it may just be worth a watch.